Back in New Zealand

Well I'm back in NZ now. I'm very glad it's summer cuz even now it doesn't feel quite as warm as it should be! Very good to be greeted by Gareth and Carissa at the airport, even though I had to wear balloon animals in front of everyone at the airport as part of my welcome home!

Gareth, me, and Carissa at the Wellington Airport. (that balloon hat thing is another couple feet high)

In the car on the way home. Gareth thought it would be nice to greet me with some of my favourite things: a soccer ball, soldier, and a random jandal. (thats my hat extending to the front of the photo)

I definitely miss Thailand and I'm gonna have to stop comparing everything to Thailand sooner or later or people will just get annoyed! It's good to be back though and I'm crashing in my old flat which is fun. There are 8 of us living here right now, and a big thanks to Gareth for giving me his bed and sleeping outside on the hammock, or climbing up the chimney to sleep in the roof! And thanks to Gareth for a yummy welcome home brownie thing.

I'm definitely glad I went to Thailand, and if anyone is considering student work, I highly recommend this mission trip, as an excellent example of how it is done in a different context. Even if you're not considering going overseas yourself, it will give you new understanding on gospel centered, word based student ministry.

Phitsanulok II

this is us hanging out at 10pm on a sunday night on campus. amazing to see so many other students doing likewise. i really loved seeing the social nature of thai people (although some say it doesnt always help their studies!)






this is a big statue of King Naresuan, who the university is named after.


Some people worshipping the statue of King Naresuan, and making merit.

dutch blitz (or technically, 'pennsylvania german blitz') is bit of a hit in thailand. id have to say though, the nakhon sawan guys are better than phitsanulok.... now im in trouble.



bob is a law student about a month out from his last law exams ever (hopefully) and hopes to be a TCS intern next year. he slept over with me at the youth house and took me to the train station, staying with me till 10:20 even though he had a class at 9. thanks bob!

breakfast, thai style while waiting for the train. mmmmm.

Phitsanulok

this is pare and me catching the bus to phitsanulok, after missing the train. sorry pare! i was sure bangkok was the other way. arrgghh.

this is bob and me at the phitsanulok youth house. johnny and ann maclean have been setting up youth houses at various uni's which are right next to campus and students can come and hang out after class and where they also meet for bible studies and english class.

this is us hanging out at the youth house after a CU meeting. i just visited for the sunday night to attend the CU meeting and catch up a bit.

after the CU meeting i got the royal tour of Naresuan university. about 10000 students live on campus and it is pretty big. these are cool solar powered buses that just pick up and drop off students around campus for free. they were still running at 10 at night!










this is us hanging out on campus for a bit. big place!

Playing in Thailand

i went to visit the curtis' who live about an hour from here. awesome to catch up with them. this is dave, ghet, bonus and me playing risk.
awesome to see nate and dave curtis again, although wished i couldve seen ben (the middle brother) as well who was my age and went from 1st grade through to 12th grade with me.
we (hannah, phil, caroline, nate) went to ayuttaya for the day which was lots of fun. it cost 50 cents for the hour train ride. awesome! (nate is my cousin who came out for another mission trip so we took him around for a bit of a tour)
in ayuttaya we rented bikes and cruised around lots of old ruins. a really awesome day. bikes are so rad! this is me trying to bunnyhop. but to everyone else, the background is probably more interesting.
nate and i had great fun taking some crazy pics and hopefully not being to disrespectful to the general public. boys and bikes, its a dangerous combination. it was pretty hot though. next time i will definitely take some boardies and go for a swim.

these are some cool stoner japanese chicks i just had to get a photo with!




while at home dad got me to cut down some trees. always fun to be up a tree with a nice big knife. especially in thailand where safety gear is an almost compulsory omission. i can see the value of motorbike helmets though. travelling 80km without one sure does sting your eyes a little!

Some trip pics

they have a really good system where people who are late to meetings/forget their namebadges are punished for their misdeeds and here i am being very much punished.







here i am embarassing myself for general entertainment.







mmmmmm, sticky rice. me being attacked by pare, as chude, shue, and james look on.






full credit to alice for taking a nice photo of our humble camp site.







NZ so needs this. a korean bbq where you sit around a small fire and kinda fry your meat and boil your vegies. extra yummy and a great way to spend our day off.

The Final Word

Hello Everyone,

Well, all the team have dispersed to Africa, Malaysia, England, and humble ol New Zealand, so I guess it's time for me to write my final letter to all you guys. The trip has been a really excellent one, and if anyone is considering student ministry, especially in an asian context, I highly recommend joining next year. It has been such a privilege to work with Johnny and Ann, who have so much wisdom and experience under their belts. It was also great to go with a team where everyone contributed 100% (we pretty much all got sick somewhere along the line) and had real positive attitudes the whole time.

So far, my conclusions from the trip?

Do I love the Thai people and see their need for the gospel? Definitely.
Is this love I feel unique to them? Don't know really.
Do I have unique skills for the Thai context? I think I could survive, which is actually quite a good start. Music and drama and high energy seem like pretty important assets over here, but I might scrape through with some sports skills.
If I had complete freedom, would I come back to Thailand as soon as possible? I think so.
Am I excited about what God is doing here? Yes.

Being the type of person I am, I would love to know now what I will be doing in 5-10 years so I can start preparing now, but I guess some patience won't kill me! In the short term, I would definitely like to support Central Thai ministry while I'm in NZ, so pray that I can meet some like minded people in the Naki who can pray with me for the work here.

This is the last email I will send out to everyone. Thanks so much for all the support you guys have given me. Hopefully in heaven I will be able to find out the effects of your guys prayers! It's been such an encouragement and I really thank God for the family He has given me in this world.

I have finally posted a couple pics on the blogsite for this trip, and hopefully will continue to post some stuff on there, regarding my life in Thailand.

Anyway, thank you all for your support and encouragement.

Soli Deo gloria,

Philip McIvor

Finally! Some pics.

this is my good mate Ball, who I met on the 3rd last day of our trip. he was a really friendly guy and invited me along to play football, and also over for dinner a couple times at his classmates house.


this is us on our day off, visiting a crocodile farm. we all got to hold a little baby crocodile as well which was cool.


we also went on a mini boat trip on our day off to see a swamp. lots of birds which was cool and this is our 'excited to see more birds' faces.


this is me at camp with som, ice, and nanzy, showing off our craft/holding random objects for additional photographic effect. they are high school girls from nakhon sawan. we are all at camp.


we did a haka at the camp, which everyone really loved. by the time we left, some of the girls were able to do the whole thing, in maori! which is pretty impressive.


me, posing for more photos. very exciting.

Thailand 3

Hi everyone,

Thanks heaps for praying! James and I went to play basketball on Wednesday night and 8 guys followed us back to the youth house to hear a short gospel message and join in an evening of games,which was really encouraging. It is really amazing to get guys coming along, as Johnny and Anne (missionaries working here) say that it is predominantly girls who come along.

Tonight we are going to be showing the movie Superman Returns and pick up on the theme of the world needing a saviour. Tomorrow night, the local church is putting on an evangelistic Christmas party for the church youth, so pray that they will have the courage to invite their friends.

It seems like time has gone by so fast, as we are due to finish next Friday!!! Our final big event will be a Christmas party on Thursday night, so I would really appreciate your prayers for that. It's also frustrating for me, as I feel like I am just starting to get a bit of a feel for this place and my Thai is almost becoming functional now! I can definitely see the need for Christ in this place, but whether God will use me directly or not, in the future is pretty unclear to me at this stage.

Thank you so much to everyone who replied. Great to hear from you, and thanks so much for praying for God's work over here.

Love Phil

Thailand 2

Hi guys,

Well I'm enjoying my trip a lot so far. We just got back from a camp yesterday (Monday), which was a great opportunity to get to know the students better, and a really exciting time to be part of them hearing the gospel. Out of the 25 students that came from the town I'm in, only 5 of them were Christians, which is really exciting. Pray that the students will respond to the challenge they have heard, and will see that Christianity is a complete change of lifestyle!

The camp was also quite an encouragement for me in getting some free time just to chat with the students and become a friend. It was also quite cool to see Hank, WinDee and Yuan come along who I've become good friends with. Please continue to pray that I will be able to have some meaningful conversations with them. There was a chinese Bible study at camp and a lot of questions were being asked which is cool. Eating rice for breakfast, lunch and dinner was an experience, along with all the guys sharing the same room, sleeping on just a plastic mat and a blanket (especially when some of the guys insisted on watching soccer until the wee hours of the morning, on the TV in the corner), but I was happy at how comfortable I found it all.
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Some prayer points I would really appreciate your prayer in are:

1. Continue to pray that I would be able to have significant conversations with the students here.

2. Pray that I would be able to meet some new students to invite along to the youth house here (where most of the outreach is done), especially as I go to play basketball.

3. Pray for all the students who heard the gospel at camp, that God's Spirit will convict their hearts and they will respond to this conviction.
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Anyway, feel free to let me know you are getting my emails and still care! Always nice to hear from home.

Love Phil